Absolution

Title: Absolution
Author: ianthe_waiting
Rating: MA/R
Disclaimer: The Harry Potter books and their characters are the property of JK Rowling. This is a work of fan-fiction. No infringement is intended, and no money is being made from this story. I am just borrowing the puppets, but this is my stage.
Genre: Angst
Warnings: Mention of abuse, character death.
Summary: “I will be your disciple, and I'll worship you, burn the prophets of reason, light the sky for you. Kill the children of Eden, if you want me to. Close the dead eyes of God, if they offended you.”
Author's Notes: Inspired by Gary Numan’s ‘Absolution.’ This is unbeta’d, please overlook any mistakes, please? Enjoy!



Absolution





I am so alone when she closes her eyes.

She shuts me out, retreating to some haven deep inside where I cannot go. In those times, I almost resent her.

So, I sing to her softly, and those eyes open, liquid amber melting and swirling in those orbs. I am in her grace again.

To explain, I really cannot sing well. That is something that my upbringing never accounted for—piano lessons, flying lessons, etiquette lessons, all the things a young Pureblood aristocrat should know. My voice was never trained other than to be able to demand acquiescence from those under me in station. Father was a role model in that respect, though often he drawled his words in a raspy purr…

I, however, did not drawl so much as an adult, and my voice, though deep, was my own and very different from my father’s.

I sang in key, I knew this much. I suppose I inherited the ability from my mother who sang to me often as a child.

I sang to her, as she sat across from me in the train compartment as the darkening landscape passed outside the window. We had left Belgrade for Athens that afternoon, and we had disagreed about something that, to me, was trivial.

My words came out soft at first, but grew louder; speaking the words of a song I had heard on the Muggle wireless. She stared at me, surprise evident on her pale face, her head turning slightly from the window, her curls bouncing about her shoulders.

I nearly stopped singing when I had her complete attention. I had her eyes and in them, I could see myself as she saw me.

Draco Malfoy, the boy who had grown up. Draco Malfoy, the boy who had forsworn everything just to be with her on this train, escaping our pasts… The Wizarding version of the Oriental Express was a pricey means of travel, but I had vast wealth at my fingertips—it meant nothing to me if she would not come with me. I had paid exorbitant amounts of Galleons for protection and privacy. No one was to know that we were on the train, and the train, an enchanted thing, kept us hidden.

I was still singing to her, and slowly, she rose.

The last refrain of the chorus cut short at her movement.

Dressed in the same clothing she wore when I ‘stole’ her away, I wondered why she had not changed. I had packed her carpetbag with her necessities and there was a trunk in the adjacent drawing room with clothing I had bought for her.

She was angry with me still, but it was the sort of anger that masked relief.

“Is that what you want from me, Draco?” she asked.

The train rocked, but she kept her footing, standing before me.

“Absolution?”

It was the name of the song, and I had spoken the word in the small chorus.

I could not answer her, not really… I had felt very justified in taking her from her home and the life she had made because she had not been happy in that life. Of course, I had no illusions that she might be happy with me, but I dared to hope.

A change of scenery, the privilege of money, which she did not have before, might change everything.

As she sat next to me on the bench near the window, the countryside becoming rougher as we entered the Macedonia Mountains, I turned my face to her. With the well-worn grey jumper that hanged off her frame like a too large skin, I could see the bruises around the base of her neck and collarbones. Those bruises galled me. She would not allow me to heal her in any way. I wondered if she wanted to wear them as a reminder.

“You want me to forgive you?”

“No,” I said.

Forgive me? Was there something to forgive or had something in me, my subconscious, chose the song? No, the lyrics were not like that at all. The words encompassed how I felt about her.

She cocked her head slightly, as if to consider me.

We had been traveling by train for days, and we had yet to speak about the events that had brought us to that moment, to the moment where I sang to her.

When her small hands cupped my face, I sighed and uncrossed my legs, the fine trousers unwrinkling over my shined Italian shoes. I supposed, sitting next to her, I looked like a businessman in dark gray trousers, button-down white shirt, ivy green tie, and silver clip with a finely cut jacket over top. She, on the other hand, looked like a girl in her Muggle denims, bare feet, and hideous jumper. It was a strange dichotomy of style, but to me, it did not matter.

Her fingers brushed a strand of my long hair behind my ear as she moved to kneel in the seat, the rocking of the train making her hair sway. I turned my waist, my chest pointing toward her, and we stared at each other—silver to gold eyes.

“Should I thank you then?”

I blinked my eyes to her lips, a perfectly pink Cupid’s bow.

“Should I be thanked for what I did, for what I am doing?”

Her hands moved to grasp my shoulders and she used the solidity of my body to pull herself nearer so her knees were touching my left thigh.

“You saved me,” she whispered and I could feel her breath on my cheek. “I had waited so long for someone to save me because I knew I could not do it myself.”

I let out a sigh, and my hands moved.

I kissed her, and she let me. I had only ever kissed her once before, though I dreamed of doing so often.

Kissing her in reality was far better than my dreams. Her mouth was soft and warm, and she tasted like the honey she had drank in her tea earlier. I allowed her to wrap her arms about my neck, as she had the night I ‘saved’ her. And I? I ran my hands down her sides, feeling every rib, feeling her trying to repress a wince when I touched her.

Having to breathe, I pulled away first.

She was not angry at me, but at herself for all the wrong reasons.

“I’d give my soul to the devil, if you asked me to,” I whispered, repeating a lyric to the song I had sung to her.

“I would never ask that…”

“I would walk out of heaven, just to be with you…”

She grinned. “So we would be in hell together?”

I nodded. I did not believe in heaven or hell, God or the devil, but I knew she did.

When she sat upon my lap, and I cradled her in my arms, I felt for the first time since that night, she wanted to be with me. As she laid her head on my shoulder, I did not mind that she closed her eyes to rest.

She did not hate me for what I had done, though she had not said it.

She did not hate me for killing her husband, the one who had bruised her neck and ribs, broken bones and nearly broke her soul. She did not hate me for relishing the kill. She had been aroused by the sight of me using my bare hands to rip the man apart, a man who had been so important to the Wizarding world, a man whose fall from grace brought her along with him.

I could still feel his blood on my hands, and I cherished the sensation as those same hands held her small body against my own.

I hummed the song under my breath, and she stirred to press a kiss into my neck.

There was no sin to absolve, there never had been though I had believed it in the beginning. I had taken her, as I had wanted to do for years. I would kill for her; I had killed for her, because she was my only god.

The train sped on through the coming darkness and I knew that perhaps, when the sun rose again, we would be in Athens. Thoughts of Britain and who might come after us were unimportant. I had killed for her to save her soul.

I would love her as I always loved her, deeply. I did not lust for her; it was not the time for that. In time, I would erase all the bad memories and make new ones for her. I would kiss every inch of her skin in worshipful detail, and I would try to give her a sublime experience.

Draco Malfoy could wait, as he had waited for years. I was simply relieved that I had not been too late.

So, I sang to her again, softer this time, looking at my own reflection in the darkened window.

“I would swim across oceans,
Just to talk with you.
I would climb a tall mountain,
Just to look at you.
I'd give my soul to the devil,
If you asked me to.
I would walk out of heaven,
Just to be with you.

This is absolute…
This is absolution.

I will be your disciple,
And I'll worship you,
Burn the prophets of reason,
Light the sky for you.
Kill the children of Eden,
If you want me to.
Close the dead eyes of God,
If they offended you.

This is absolute…
This is absolution.”




* * *





It had been six years since he had last seen her, and in those six years, he wondered about her from time to time.

Hermione Granger, the brain of the ‘Golden Trio,’ had somehow stayed out of the limelight following the War.

As he watched her from the steps leading up to Gringotts, he saw something that startled him to the core. She was bone thin, dark rings under her eyes, and limping slightly as she struggled to keep up pace behind her husband—the Boy Who Lived.

People were more interested in Harry Potter for once again he was a figure of interest. His life was splashed across the papers weekly, and the last Draco Malfoy knew, Potter had been fired from his job at the Ministry. He had not read past the headline, and he did not know the details, he was, actually, far more interested in the woman who trailed behind him.

Hermione Granger, twice married, was first widowed, and then taken in by her best friend. Potter never married, though it was well known that he still trifled with the only daughter of the now deceased Arthur Weasley.

Hermione Granger…

He shook his head in disgust, not because the brilliant witch had become so thin and transparent, but because she had allowed herself to become so.

Draco knew Ron Weasley had been so kind to Granger, a perfect husband, and that the two were so disgustingly happy that he grew to resent them both. When Weasley died in the ‘line of duty,’ Draco supposed Potter felt obligated to see to Granger. But to marry? There was something amiss.

Draco was not sure why he decided to follow Granger, but he did. He followed her through Diagon Alley, staring at her lank curls and her limping left leg. He did not care about Potter, who seemed to part the crowd in the Alley with his angry gaze, he did not care if Potter noticed him in his black robes and trademark long pale blond hair.

All he cared about was knowing and understanding why Granger was following Potter like a lost, beaten, and broken pet.

Draco’s conceptions of her were shattering, and this fact made him illogically angry.

He had to know… Granger was strong, she was true, she was fierce, and she was very much her own woman, or she had been, once upon a time.

He had to know, though it was not his business at all and he had things he had to attend to that meant the security of his finances.

Granger, Granger, Granger—it was his only thought as he neared her. He could reach out and grab her then, but did not as the archway to the Leaky Cauldron came into view. However, Potter and Granger did not go to the pub, but veered to head toward Knockturn Alley.

Granger would never go to such a place…

It was in a spot in the shadow that Potter took a hold of Granger, slamming her into the wall. Draco watched from around the corner to the Alley.

Potter spoke roughly to the smaller woman whose eyes were stuck to the rubbish on the ground, but Draco could not hear.

Why should he care?

When Potter grasped her arm with the wrapped wrist, she winced, but did not cry out.

He did care.

The couple Disapparated and Draco glided to the spot, still feeling the lingering magic. Closing his eyes, he found the trace and followed.

It was from that point on, Draco realized that he would absolve himself to Granger. Seeing the ramshackle house they lived in, watching through the windows from the limbs of an oak tree outside, he watched Potter pour his bile, his demons; out onto the woman he had married for security.

It was strange how the ‘Boy Who Lived’ had descended into infamy while a Mudblood like Granger was still highly revered.

Perched on a limb like a strange angel, Draco watched for two days before he could watch no longer.

On the third day, he came to call on the Potter house, as a neighbor, who, surprisingly, only lived two villages away.

He would insinuate himself beside Granger, just to know…

…and act accordingly.

So it began…the absolution of them both.




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To hear the song by Gary Numan, watch the clip! It is audio only, and a newer remix, which I prefer over the 1995 version.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQL97Wzm8jY